Any-one succesfully connected a laser to the Bitsensor control board?

Attached is my connection... I can switch the laser on/off and adjust power, but it is not strong enough to make engravings. Adjusting the power also seems to work in reverse, when i increase power in Mach 3 software the power of the lase seems to decrease...

Do i have the connection correct?
Is my problem at the Mach 3 software?

Hi,
As far as I can tell, the wiring is wrong. The analog output AVI (also known as PWM) needs the source voltage referenced to ACM (Analog/PWM common/ground). That is, 5V power input to the point marked 10V and the supply ground to ACM. The output AVI is correct.
The three pins ACM, AVI, and 10V are all on a separate fully isolated circuit. Your power supply to must be between 10V and ACM.
To achieve better linearity on setting laser power, I would use a power supply input of 10 to 12 volts to the 10V input and software configure maximum PWM output to about 50% of 10Volts to output a more accurate 5 Volts to your laser control input. With a 5 Volts power input, the output voltage AVI at 100% PWM will probably only reach 4 volts. You will get only about 80% of your laser power. 
Good luck,
Bill

Thanks Bill.
 I followed this setup and the laser works fine with M3/ M5 commands, however I get spot burns. I cannot get it to work with M11/M10 commands and I'm not able to adjust intensity. Any idea what I can look at to get this sorted?

Ok, I did the calibration and can now adjust intensity. But still not able to use M11 command.

The Bitsensor board does not support the M11/M10 command set.
The alternative method of laser switching (to avoid the burn marks associated with the M3/M5) is to use the direction pin of an imaginary axis.
For example set up the B axis then use B0 for laser OFF and B1 for laser ON.
Unlike the M3/M5 an axis command such as B0/B1 does not break the CV chain so there is no delay when laser switching.

Tweakie.

Thanks Tweakie,

For this I would imagine you setup your Motor Outputs (see attached). The coding should be simple enough to figure out.
What else do I need to do?

From the setup you have shown you would use Pin 11 as the laser On/Off switch. This becomes the Pin that would otherwise have been controlled by the M11/M10 commands.
To control laser power (by Spindle PWM) you would need to gate together the On/Off (Pin 11) and PWM signals.

This method is described in more detail in this thread;
https://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php?topic=12444.msg265104#msg265104

Tweakie.

Hi Tweakie,

So if I understand this correctly, I need to gate together On/Off (Pin 11) and PWM signals by using a basic logic IC. Without a proper description of how to do this or a video to guide me I will not be able to do this.

I have a 4 axis CNC and the bitsensor only supports 4 axis, will the imaginary axis method work?

It seems to me the best will be to get a control board that supports the M10/M11 commands. Any recommendations?

Thanks,
Nico

I think you may be underestimating your ability – it would not be difficult for you to gate the two signals using an opto-coupler or an IC. You just need to do a bit of reading / research and be confident.

The BitSensor will work OK with an imaginary axis setup as long as you have two spare Output Pin# (one for the imaginary B Direction signal and one for the PWM signal).
As the Z axis is not used during laser working another alternative may be to use the Z axis Direction Pin#.

I believe that all the Mach3 external motion controllers made in the EU and the USA support the M11/M10 commands (none of the Chinese motion controllers do).
Although there are many different makes to choose from the Warp9 ESS may be a good choice.

Hope this helps.

Tweakie.